Masterful Magic Channeling

You can strengthen a spell by channeling additional energy into it before casting. This is the masterful level of channeling. To channel at this level you spend 8 additional Soul.  When doing so, you are able to strengthen the spell in four ways. You can only choose one option.

Option 1: You can increase the damage or healing value of your spells. If you choose to increase the spell's damage or healing value, you add in 4 additional dice of the spell's damage or healing power. In the case of a spell that has mixed dice, you will use the larger die size to determine the extra die added. 

Option 2: You can increase the spell's duration. If you choose to increase the spell's duration, you increase it by 3d4. You are only increasing the spell's duration, not the duration of any secondary effects. If the spell lasts 1d4 rounds and causes 1d4 rounds of blindness, this allows the spell to last 4d4 rounds but it still will only cause 1d4 rounds of blindness. If the spell is an instant duration spell or a countdown spell the duration cannot be changed.

Option 3: You can decrease the spell's Cast Speed, making it cast faster. With this option, you decrease the Cast Speed by 2. You cannot decrease the Cast Speed to less than 1. If you are using this option with other abilities and effects that decrease Cast Speed, this is applied first. 

Option 4: This option can only be used with Tier 3 and higher spells. With this option, you can combine your higher tier level spell with a tier level 1 spell. In this case you would spend the 8 Soul plus the Soul costs of the two spells. They will cast as 1 spell, using only the Cast Speed of the higher level spell. Furthermore, succeeding to cast the higher level spell automatically passes the check for the tier 1 spell. You will not need to roll a second check. However, if the higher level spell fails to cast, the lower level spell cannot cast and the magic channeling cannot happen. The Soul cost of the channeling and the lower level spell are not spent, but the Soul cost of the higher level spell will happen. Both spells are cast at the same target or same area. The lower level spell automatically is cast at the same target or area as the higher level spell. If the lower level spell is only 1 target and the higher level spell covers an area, the 1 target of the lower level spell will either be the main target of the higher level spell, or the center of the area of the higher level spell - depending upon the targeting rules of the higher level spell. If the lower level spell covers a greater area, it will be constrained to only the area or target range of the higher level spell. Furthermore, if the lower level spell has a range dice roll but the higher level spell doesn't, and both are 1 target spells, the lower level spell will still hit that one target even if it is out of its normal range.  Both spells must be known by the runic mage to be cast. Neither spell gains any of the channeling bonuses from the other options. 

A channeled spell's full Soul cost cannot be reduced by Magical Training. The extra effects a spell might cause are not increased. Channeling can only be performed once per casting. You can choose to use this ability or one of the other Magic Channeling abilities. You cannot choose to use more than one magic channeling ability per spell cast. 

Example: Fang costs 2 Soul and deals 4d4 damage. With this masterful level of channeling you spend another 8 Soul to add an extra 4d4 damage to the spell, bringing the spell to cost 10 Soul and deal 8d4 damage. If the spell damages or heals for example 3d10, this ability will increase that by 4d10. If a spell deals or heals for 2d10+1d6, you will use the larger die size, adding +4d10 to the damage or healing value. If the duration isn't a rolled duration, for example 3 rounds, or if the duration is a different dice value such as 1d6 rounds, the duration increase is still +3d4 rounds.